Tag Archives: change

CLASSIC POSTS REVISITED (new twists on old themes)

Still no ‘instant pudding’

July 3, 2018 Simon Black Leave a comment

An earlier version of this was first posted on 3rd June 2013

When we consider change in the workplace we should “see things as a human system: people, the work that we do, the interactions we have with each other, the physical environment that we create and use. These

Don't go for the "quick mix-quick fix" — Don’t hope for the “quick mix – quick fix”

are the routes to change.”

This is great because as humans we have the privilege of choice; we can be proactive and make things happen.

The down side of this is that this situation is by its nature complex – other people might not feel the same as us and may put up barriers or counter-proposals.

As a consequence, to make things change, we need to encourage people to change – or at least the people who have an impact on outcomes (note: trying to change people who cannot affect change is a sure-fire route to getting unpopular AND will fail to have impact in any event – so don’t make people the problem).

To encourage people to change we need to change their thinking, how they value people, how they understand why results occur, how systems work (or don’t work), how to distinguish between ups and downs, between real improvements and one-off blips in performance.

Some people may have an epiphany and see new ways to operate, whilst other people may more gradually understand the need for a new perspective. Either way new thinking has to be embedded in our habits and ways of working and this usually takes practice.

This is consistent with Herrero’s (2006) suggestion that new behaviours are needed FIRST to support proposed changes in processes and systems.

Quoting his mentor Deming, Donald Wheeler tells us that “The [new] way of thinking – has to be cultivated. This will take both time and practice. There is no instant pudding. There is no shortcut.”

To effect change is to do it… and to keep doing it. To be the change … and sticking to it.

As Wheeler says “There’s nothing to it but to do it.”

Further Reading:

Herrero, L. (2006) Viral Change, meetingminds, UK.

Wheeler D.J. (2000) Understanding Variation: the Key to Managing Chaos, SPC Press, Knoxville, TE

Change Principles, CLASSIC POSTS REVISITED (new twists on old themes), Culture, Dialogue

The Need for Speed : change need not be a slow business

February 13, 2017 Simon Black 1 Comment

An earlier version of this was first posted on 13th February 2012

Change is very often considered to be a slow and often difficult process. In particular, ‘culture change’ is seen as a long and winding road. Human beings are notable as creatures that have mastered (or, at least, have developed) the art of adapting. We have changed our knowledge, decisions, behaviour, environment, relationships, societies. It is too easy to think that we ‘don’t like change’. This is simply not the case. We are beings that not only adapt to what is around us, but we often actively choose to change what is around us. After all, it is not uncommon for us to seek to find ways to make things better or different (either for ourselves or, sometimes, others!).

My great-grandfather (who was still around when I was a youngster) was born into the Victorian age in the 1880s. He was already a young man when the Wright brothers first flew at Kitty Hawk, yet lived to experience flying in jet airliners and even saw the Apollo astronauts land on the moon. His life experiences, work and education had to adapt fairly radically, but I imagine it was a fairly natural process – that’s life.

Organisations can change faster that society as a whole. Whilst change should be seen as a ‘natural’ process, it is one which we should actively influence ourselves. Change can occur in noticeable timescales; weeks and months not years. Changes should move into short timescales to become noticeable, rather than at barely-observable ‘glacial’ rates. Herrero (2006) goes further, suggesting that if cultural changes cannot be observed in short time-frames, then something is wrong.

“Cultural change does NOT need to be a slow and painful long-term affair.” – there is a better way.
“Short-term wins CAN represent real change.” with viral networks which engage many people, small changes can lead to a big impact.

We need to accelerate change by engaging networks of people in making things happen. In a previous post it was suggested that small sets of behavioural changes, taken on and shared by informal groups of people can generate improvements in a non-linear way, as Hererro terms it, a ‘viral’ spread.

To influence others we need to encourage quick, meaningful changes; not just ticking items off the ‘to do’ list, but adopting new behaviours, new ways of thinking, new habits. These things may appear less tangible, but they do have impact, they don’t need to wait for a sign-off by top management and they do allow change to happen much quicker.

Remember to read:

Herrero, L. (2006) Viral Change, meetingminds, UK.

CLASSIC POSTS REVISITED (new twists on old themes)

Engaging people in change – let’s consider mind, emotions & matter

October 4, 2016 Simon Black Leave a comment

An earlier version of this was first posted on October 4th 2013

Our brains process rational, physical & emotional responses to the wider world in which we live, work, learn & adapt.

It has been mentioned several times elsewhere on this blog site how easy it is to shrug off the importance of emotions at work. Emotions, rather than being dealt with and utilised, are often herded into one of two extreme boxes; on one hand ‘negative‘ feelings (e.g. fear, discouragement, upset, depression, disillusionment), whilst on the other ‘positive‘ feelings (e.g. celebration, recognition, encouragement).

However if we are sharing opinions or ideas or even managing more complex changes in the workplace, we should take more care to consider the importance of the emotional engagement of colleagues.

Rarely does rational argument win the day; often either physical elements (e.g. hierarchy) or emotional elements (e.g. engaging support) are also needed.

As Seddon states, time and time again, change is a normative process. What does he mean by this? What IS ‘normative’? Normative status is based upon our social understanding and values – we stick to what we stick to; we believe what we believe. Until these perspectives (or ‘paradigms – there is that word again!) are challenged and a person is willing to re-educate themselves, then different possibilities will often remain rejected or ignored.

Change has to be an experiential process and part of that process is to ‘un-learn’ previous thinking. It is possible to do this – even world -class golfers can unlearn and re-learn how to hit a golf ball in order to make significant improvement. Nevertheless this is a difficult thing to do. A person has to be ready and willing – emotionally engaged – to want to make the change. And that is just to change a golf swing!

STRATEGIES FOR CHANGE – which will work best?

Power ~ Coercive

BUT…

Assumes that people are generally compliant so will usually do what they are told or can be made to do. Change is achieved by exercising authority and by imposing sanctions. Relies on authority, and the ability to police future actions.

Empirical ~ Rational

BUT…

People are rational and will follow self-interest — once those interests have been revealed to them. Change is based on the communication of information and offers of incentives. Focuses on incentives, which need to work over the long term.

Normative ~ Re-educative

*TRY THIS APPROACH!

People are social creatures and will follow cultural beliefs, traditions and values. Change is based on redefining and reinterpreting these norms & values, and developing people’s commitments to new ones.

If you encourage people to seek knowledge and identify helpful changes, you steer learning towards the issues which those people need to address to make things better.

Further Reading:

Bennis,W. G., Benne, K.D. and Chin R. (1969) The Planning of Change. Holt, Rinehart & Winston, NY

Jacobs, C.J. (2009) Management Rewired: Why Feedback Doesn’t Work and Other Surprising Lessons from the Latest Brain Science, Penguin Group Portfolio, NY

Seddon, J. (2005) Freedom from Command and Control, Vanguard Press, Buckingham, UK.

Sherkenbach W.W. (1991) Deming’s Road to Continual Improvement, SPS Press, Knoxville, TE

Updates

Four years of reflection: many years of learning

November 24, 2015 Simon Black Leave a comment

This article sees the completion of four years of blogging on this site and this is the 112th article. There is a wide range of material available across the site.

Use our search facility for any keywords you wish, to find a relevant resource.

Key themes we have highlighted over the years include:

• Don’t do it to people: understand the system of work first

• Don’t chase things that don’t
exist (like supposed trends in data)

• Build knowledge, not opinion

• Don’t rely on top down change Culture change is not something that you 'do' to people

• Change can be quick & painless at the right point of intervention

• Leadership is about followers more
than about the leader

• Decision making can involve people in many different ways

• Teamwork is about Purpose, Goals & Process more than about Behaviour

Some key searches which may be of interest include:
Team; Improvement; Leadership; Motivation

Key source articles include those by:
Deming; Herrero; Seddon; Senge; Covey; Scholtes

Change Principles, Excellence

Do costs of ‘improvement’ really indicate the relevance of an initiative?

October 5, 2015 Simon Black 3 Comments

Improvement: shoot this nag and replace it with a new horse, or ox or a steam tractor. Instead why not just give it decent food, water & exercise? What is the impact? What is the cost?

A lot of money is spent on ‘change’ and ‘improvement’. Often a major restructure or implementation of IT are at the fore in improvement investments with new facilities or equipment upgrades (both of which are costly) are not far behind on the list.

It is also common for money or time (usually both) to be spent on customer surveys or staff surveys to glean ‘data’ which it is hoped will inform what type of improvement is needed. Is this always necessary? Is the money which is spent on improvement a good indicator of whether that improvement will be worthwhile – is it a decent ‘return on investment’. This is not always clear, since a change may set off a spiral of outcomes (which will generate positive cost savings and new negative cost burdens) but which may or may not be included in the overall analysis of ‘total cost’ (when they should really be included).

Pat Nevin identified how a small (low cost) change to the surface around top flight professional football pitches could improve the quality of football during competitive matches; an analysis achieved just by looking at the ‘system’ of football in modern stadiums. The cost-benefit might be hard to gauge, but at very least, reduced likelihood of player injury (e.g. slipping on the surface and twisting a knee) is likely to be worth hundreds of thousands of pounds.

Are IT system introductions always based on knowing how the system should operate to deliver its correct purpose? Are restructures based on knowing how the system will deliver the team’s correct purpose? Will a new piece of new equipment enable a worker to deliver their correct job purpose? Or will these changes just enable a piece of work (which may in itself not be relevant any more) to be done faster, more cleanly, in a ‘modern’ way, in a more ‘user friendly’ manner, yet have no impact on delivery the things that matter (the purpose of the work)?

Understanding the impact of incremental improvements is important. We need to assess what is happening in work, whether the patterns are consistent and predictable, then make a reasoned change and monitor if the impact is positive, then continue the cycle. This is continuous improvement and is based upon building knowledge. It is less ‘sexy’, has lower profile and takes time, but the outcomes are far superior – a better way.

Further Reading:

Herrero, L. (2006) Viral Change, meetingminds, UK.

Juran J. (1989) Juran on Leadership For Quality,The Free Press, NY

Scholtes, P. (1998), The Leader’s Handbook: A guide to inspiring your people and managing the daily workflow, New York: McGraw-Hill

Seddon, J. (2005) Freedom from Command and Control, Vanguard Press, Buckingham, UK.

Senge P. (1990) The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organisation, Doubleday, New York.

Change Principles, Culture, Excellence, Leadership, Service, Trust

Should we say it again? People are not the problem.

June 6, 2014 Simon Black Leave a comment

Deming famously stated “I should estimate that in my experience most troubles and most possibilities for improvement add up to the proportions something like this: 94% belongs to the system (responsibility of management), 6% special.“. In other words people-related ‘fault’ will be part of the minority 6%.

This statement tends to set people into a degree of hand-wringing ifs and buts: ‘surely he meant this only in a manufacturing system’, ‘ what about the difficult people?’, ‘ what if they are incompetent?’, ‘I am sure folks are the problem 40% of the time’ etc…

Chip and Dan Heath share a trivial, but insightful example in their book ‘Switch’. They discuss a situation (part of a research exercise) where moviegoers eat significantly more popcorn if they are given large buckets, than if they are given small buckets. To the outsider it looks like the people are ‘Popcorn Gorging Gluttons’ and we may feel that we should judge them as so. In reality, their behaviour (eating excessive amounts of popcorn) is driven by the system – the size of bucket they have been given. Change the bucket for a small one and their behaviour changes – they seem like moderate consumers. The system is the problem (large buckets), not the people.

“But aha – surely it’s their fault that they choose to scoff down the popcorn!”. True, we are sentient beings and can make choices (for example, I would hope that people who are aware of supermarket sales floor design are less likely to buy excessive amounts of fresh baked goods, fresh fruit and ‘buy-one-get-one-free’ items). I am not suggesting that we should excuse everyone of their behaviour 95% of the time. There are other things to consider – for example do we run on autopilot too often (Do we let the chimp drive the car? More for a later blog I think…)?

However as a start we need to be honest enough to examine our own assumptions as placed upon others and how we judge their behaviour. As the Heath brothers suggest, to do this we need to encounter a deep-rooted phenomenon identified in psychology.

Kendra Cherry explains -“When it comes to other people, we tend to attribute causes to internal factors such as personality characteristics and ignore or minimize external variables. This phenomenon tends to be very widespread, particularly among individualistic cultures.“

In Psychology this is known as the fundamental attribution error – we automatically assume that the person’s internal characteristics are the cause of behaviour even when other possible influencing factors are present in the situation.

So let’s pull away from assumption and open our minds to what is really happening with people.

Further Reading:

Deming W.E. (1982) Out of the Crisis (p315), MIT CAES, Cambridge MA.

Heath C., and Heath, D. (2010) Switch: when change is hard, New York: Random House

Peters S. (2012) The Chimp Paradox: The Mind Management Programme to Help You Achieve Success, Confidence and Happiness. Vermillion, London.

Other links:

Cherry, K. (2014) Attribution: How we explain behaviour. http://psychology.about.com/od/socialpsychology/a/attribution.htm

Change Principles, Myths

Culture “Change”: a new frontier or more disruption and waste?

March 10, 2014 Simon Black Leave a comment

The idea of ‘culture change’ has been around at least since the 1970s.

Company culture was flagged as the new route to progress and competitiveness. A good company culture was seen as the antidote to inefficiency, obsolescence and lethargy. The old ways were habits to throw away, to be ashamed of, to turn our back on. People who don’t adapt are seen as dinosaurs or stuck in the dark ages.

This trend in thinking gave rise to a plethora of ‘culture change’ programmes, usually involving energetic efforts to describe company values, visions, extended programmes of training, sometimes introspection (on the part of managers), browbeating and exhortation (of employees), ‘communication cascades’, ‘town-hall meeting’ and suchlike. To support this, various four-box models, multi-ring schematics, life-cycles and illustrations sprung into life to describe this intangible ‘thing’ of culture. But is ‘culture’ a cause or an effect of what happens in organisations?

Peter Drucker stated: “company cultures are like country cultures. Never try to change one. Try instead to work with what you’ve got.” This is pragmatic thinking – and in many senses he is right – but not wholly so. A different perspective is needed, since sometimes the pervading culture can be damaging, counterproductive or simply unfair or unethical.

The culture in a company, or department, or team, or any type of organisation CAN actually be changed, but it is not achieved by trying to change the culture itself. Seddon suggests that we should never make efforts to change a culture by ‘doing it to them’ (Seddon 2005). People will resent it – and also people tend to detect any manipulation or ‘brainwashing’ a mile off. This increases resistance, undermines trust, garners cynicism and is generally unhelpful – the opposite of what you intend.

Don’t try to change people by attempting to change people, instead influence them to change themselves. The same is true of organisations. We can avoid a great waste of time, energy and resources if we skip this approach and instead work on things which really matter to people – and matter to our organisation. Just like forcefield analysis, it is better to identify and remove the forces that are driving the negative culture, rather than push at the positives.

The most effective approach is to intervene at the point of work. Deal with the issues which people already find difficult or frustrating. Remove the conditions which impose upon them the negative behaviours which we want to eliminate. Give them a sense of purpose to fix their ideas upon – how things could change for the better and what THEY can do about it.

Reading:

Drucker PF ( 1993) Managing for the Future: the 1990s and beyond New York: NY, Dutton.

Jacobs, C.J. (2009) Management Rewired: Why Feedback Doesn’t Work and Other Surprising Lessons from the Latest Brain Science, Penguin Group Portfolio, NY

Seddon, J. (2005) Freedom from Command and Control, Vanguard Press, Buckingham, UK.

Change Principles, Leadership

Cool runnings? Change perspectives. Just do it.

February 24, 2014 Simon Black 1 Comment

It is a sporting theme again, inspired by the thrills of the Winter Olympics. Let’s hark back to the 1988 Calgary Games, memorable since British involvement started to impress outside the ice-rink. Eccentricities of Eddie ‘the Eagle’ Edwards, our first Olympic ski-jumper matched Martin Bell’s efforts in the men’s downhill. Even our bob-sledders were competitive.

One story, now globally famous, concerns the Jamaican soldiers formed into an unlikely bobsleigh team on a shoestring budget, qualifying in 1988 as the first tropical nation at the Winter Olympics. American expats George Fitch and William Maloney were inspired by watching Jamaican push-kart racing and had initially raised the idea. At the outset, one of the eventual Jamaican team members, Devon Harris, thought the idea was ridiculous. Another, Dudley Stokes, only got involved because his superior officer in the military told him to participate.

The story was largely fictionalised for dramatic effect in the comedy film ‘Cool Runnings’. In reality the team were warmly welcomed by co-competitors and enjoyed the support of other national teams to access equipment ahead of the Games. The Jamaicans performances improved during the Games programme, but unfortunately they crashed in their final competitive run so did not reach the final. However the precedent had been set and Jamaican teams have qualified for several Winter Games over subsequent decades including the Sochi 2014 Olympics.

So what can we learn? How does this relate to our ideas for change and improvement?

Just do it – and keep trying. If things don’t quite work, don’t give up. George Fitch failed to recruit Jamaican athletes, so asked the Jamaican military to find volunteers.
Other people respond to your initiative. Jamaica’s competitors welcomed the team as co-athletes, whilst the Olympic crowds were fanatically enthusiastic about the team’s efforts.
People can be inspired – your team may have skeptics and cynics, but they can all be inspired by purpose and vision of what is possible and what they can do.
Learn from disappointments. Since the crash of 1988, Jamaica have performed at a high level, beating established winter sport nations such as France, the USA, Russia and Canada.
The unlikely can become the norm. A later Jamaican team-member, Lascelles Brown, married a Canadian, and subsequently won medals for Canada at two Olympic Games.
Seize the opportunity – even unlikely ideas can set a new way of doing things. Small initiatives can have a lasting effect. It just takes the effort to start the ball rolling…

Links:

BBC Sport (2014) Jamaica’s ‘Cool Runnings’ bobsleigh team in 1988, Sochi 2014http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/winter-olympics/25144672

Evanovitch (2005) Interview with Devon ‘Pele’ Harris Jamaica Bobsled Team Member, Jamaica Primetime. http://www.jamaicans.com/articles/primeinterviews/interviewdevonharris.shtml

Jones E. (2014) Va. Mayor’s Little Known Link to Jamaican Bobsledding, NBC Washington http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/Va-Mayor-Cool-Connection-to-Jamaicas-Bobsled-Team-243973451.html

Change Principles

Initiating Change…and making it happen

November 22, 2013 Simon Black Leave a comment

Change can be a threatening experience for people

The autumn brings a cycle of change; in temperate zones it is a shifting of the seasons when people traditionally reset themselves for the challenges of the coming year after the pleasures and abundances of the summer.The harvest is securely stored, now the ground must be prepared for the next year’s crops.

In organizations it is a milestone which sets off a new sales season, a refreshed programme of activity, a new intake of students, or preparations for a new budget.

It is a good time to have mental ‘re-fresh’ to consider what ‘CHANGE is all about.

Peter Senge (1990) suggests a number of principles in initiating change:

(i) there must be a compelling case for change;

(ii) there must be time to change;

(iii) help must be provided during the change process

(iv) there is a need to keep an eye open to new barriers after initial roadblocks have been removed.

When we make change happen, we need to recognise that, as carefully as we might plan it, we must be poised to learn and adapt to outcomes. Even if plans are thorough, they will always be based to some degree upon assumption – and those same assumptions and expectations might change as we gain more knowledge when we put things into action on the ground.

• Assumptions can be made about purpose , the reason for being at our place of work
– we should always test ourselves by asking ‘why are we doing this?’
• Assumptions can be made about people, what they do well, or when they make mistakes
– without understanding the constraints they face; a ‘people problem’ or something else?
• Assumptions can be made about good performance, and reasons to celebrate
– without knowing the true cost of that performance; is it sustainable?
• Assumptions can be made about one-off failures, or chronic repeating failures
– without knowing which is which, nor the underlying causes of their occurrence
• Assumptions can be made about cause and effect, and implementing solutions
– without understanding potential unintended consequences.

The best way of overcoming assumptions is to talk to people to identify things to examine; then to examine those things (by getting useful data); then evaluate the outcomes of our examination; then identify what to act upon and how – Plan-Do-Check-Act (starting at ‘Check’).

We must get better at using knowledge, and distance ourselves from rhetoric and assumption. This is done by understanding the system we work in, how to properly measure its performance, and what we can do about it with careful experimentation.

There is a neat way to define the power of working on the system, versus the expectations placed on people; it sends a message to anyone wanting to improve the way things work in their team. This quote is, I understand, attributed to Geary Rummler:

“Put a good performer in a bad system – and the system wins every time.”

In other words, don’t go around trying to change people; instead put effort into changing the system, and get your people involved in initiating the change…and making it happen.

Counter-intuition: the key to change?

September 9, 2013 Simon Black Leave a comment

Like it or not, our brains are biologically structured to process information in two distinct ways (more actually, but we will focus on two here). On one hand we can process huge amounts of routine, familiar information, whilst on the other hand we are also adept at processing novel information.

Having a brain that can quickly process vast amounts of routine information is very helpful; it allows us to work on auto-pilot when we want to think about other things. If we step out from a dark hallway onto a busy, sunlit street, we do not feel overloaded with information. Instead we fit what we see, hear and smell into our mental models (‘paradigms’ in the technical jargon) and filter the information to best understand what is happening and where we are – and we go about our business of the day.

Much as this might be a strength, it can also be a hindrance. Even the predators of human prehistory adapted successful strategies to exploit this weakness. The crouching tiger hidden in the bushes can easily remain unseen to the unsuspecting passer-by until it is too late…

tiger in the bushes — You probably will not see the tiger until it makes a move

Fortunately we are not simply data-processors; the architecture of our brain provides other capabilities. If we perceive something unfamiliar, such as the backfire of a car engine, we notice it. If a carnival procession turns into the street we notice it. We adapt both our expectations and our behaviour. If movement is noticed in the bushes we ready ourselves for fight or flight – let’s hope it is not a tiger!

Learning works on this counter-intuitive level. John Seddon often talks about revealing counter-intuitive truths to open people’s minds to change. Neuroscience describes this as ‘cognitive dissonance’; stopping our mind from processing automatically and setting us up to restructure our thinking.

Charles Jacobs (2009) suggests that change is as much about re-structuring thinking as it is changing things like IT systems, team members, job descriptions, terms and conditions, performance measures or budgets. The latter are all methods which , although familiar ‘instruments of change’, are misunderstood or poorly executed. Furthermore just implementing new ‘stuff’ can be observed by somewhat cynically by employees as either management tinkering or a lame or half-baked compromise. The result is little or no lasting change.

A game-changing approach is more effective. Jacobs’ describes how Mahatma Gandhi chose to meet violence with non-violence, breaking the cycle of escalation and opening a different dialogue for change.

In managing change, we need to take more account of what needs to be done to change people’s minds. According to Jacobs, to “stop the way people are thinking now and create a new way of thinking that will drive the behaviour we need to achieve the future…”

Further Reading:

Deming W.E. (1993) The New Economics, MIT CAES, Cambridge MA.

Jacobs, C.J. (2009) Management Rewired: Why Feedback Doesn’t Work and Other Surprising Lessons from the Latest Brain Science, Penguin Group Portfolio, NY

Seddon, J. (2005) Freedom from Command and Control, Vanguard Press, Buckingham, UK.

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